Penguin's Poems for Life
Page 13
To the six-o’clock news and a lime-juice and gin.
The scent of the conifers, sound of the bath,
The view from my bedroom of moss-dappled path,
As I struggle with double-end evening tie,
For we dance at the Golf Club, my victor and I.
On the floor of her bedroom lie blazer and shorts
And the cream-coloured walls are be-trophied with sports,
And westering, questioning settles the sun
On your low-leaded window, Miss Joan Hunter Dunn.
The Hillman is waiting, the light’s in the hall,
The pictures of Egypt are bright on the wall,
My sweet, I am standing beside the oak stair
And there on the landing’s the light on your hair.
By roads ‘not adopted’, by woodlanded ways,
She drove to the club in the late summer haze,
Into nine-o’clock Camberley, heavy with bells
And mushroomy, pine-woody, evergreen smells.
Miss Joan Hunter Dunn, Miss Joan Hunter Dunn,
I can hear from the car-park the dance has begun.
Oh! full Surrey twilight! importunate band!
Oh! strongly adorable tennis-girl’s hand!
Around us are Rovers and Austins afar,
Above us, the intimate roof of the car,
And here on my right is the girl of my choice,
With the tilt of her nose and the chime of her voice,
And the scent of her wrap, and the words never said,
And the ominous, ominous dancing ahead.
We sat in the car park till twenty to one
And now I’m engaged to Miss Joan Hunter Dunn.
WILLIAM BLAKE
from An Island in the Moon
Hail Matrimony, made of Love!
To thy wide gates how great a drove
On purpose to be yok’d do come;
Widows and Maids and Youths also,
That lightly trip on beauty’s toe,
Or sit on beauty’s bum.
Hail fingerfooted lovely Creatures!
The females of our human natures,
Formed to suckle all Mankind.
’Tis you that come in time of need,
Without you we should never breed,
Or any comfort find.
For if a Damsel’s blind or lame,
Or Nature’s hand has crook’d her frame,
Or if she’s deaf, or is wall-eyed;
Yet, if her heart is well inclin’d,
Some tender lover she shall find
That panteth for a Bride.
The universal Poultice this,
To cure whatever is amiss
In Damsel or in Widow gay!
It makes them smile, it makes them skip;
Like birds, just cured of the pip,
They chirp and hop away.
Then come, ye maidens! come, ye swains!
Come and be cur’d of all your pains
In Matrimony’s Golden Cage –
EDMUND SPENSER
from Prothalamion
Ye gentle Birds, the world’s fair ornament,
And heaven’s glories, whom this happy hour
Doth lead unto your lover’s blissful bower,
Joy may you have and gentle heart’s content
Of your love’s couplement:
And let faire Venus, that is Queen of love,
With her heart-quelling Sun upon you smile,
Whose smile they say, hath virtue to remove
All Love’s dislike, and friendship’s faulty guile
For ever to assoil.
Let endless Peace your steadfast hearts accord,
And blessed Plenty wait upon your board,
And let your bed with pleasures chaste abound,
That fruitful issue may to you afford:
Which may your foes confound,
And make your joys redound,
Upon your Bridal day, which is not long:
Sweet Thames run softly, till I end my Song.
EDWARD LEAR
The Owl and the Pussy-cat
The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to sea
In a beautiful pea-green boat,
They took some honey, and plenty of money,
Wrapped up in a five-pound note.
The Owl looked up to the stars above,
And sang to a small guitar,
‘O lovely Pussy! O Pussy, my love,
What a beautiful Pussy you are,
You are,
You are!
What a beautiful Pussy you are!’
Pussy said to the Owl, ‘You elegant fowl!
How charmingly sweet you sing!
O let us be married! too long we have tarried:
But what shall we do for a ring?’
They sailed away, for a year and a day,
To the land where the Bong-tree grows,
And there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood,
With a ring at the end of his nose,
His nose,
His nose,
With a ring at the end of his nose.
‘Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling
Your ring?’ Said the Piggy, ‘I will.’
So they took it away, and were married next day
By the Turkey who lives on the hill.
They dined on mince, and slices of quince,
Which they ate with a runcible spoon;
And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand,
They danced by the light of the moon,
The moon,
The moon,
They danced by the light of the moon.
CARMEN BUGAN
A house of stone
for Mark and Ella
In the village where I was born, we wish
A house of stone to shelter the heart of the marriage
So here too, I wish you
Obstinate, strong love, unyielding and unending.
May you be in reach of each other when all seems lost,
May your tears and your smiles happen always face to
face.
When you imagine that you have shared everything
May you know that you still have the rest of your lives
To do all of it again and again.
But now listen to the hurry of bells and
Look how petals of roses about the vineyard
Bring you the words, ‘husband’ and ‘wife’:
First words in your house of stone.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Sonnet 116
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments; love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
O no, it is an ever-fixèd mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.
Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle’s compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY
from The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia
My true-love hath my hart, and I have his,
By just exchange one for the other giv’n.
I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss:
There never was a better bargain driv’n.
His hart in me, keeps me and him in one;
My hart in him, his thoughts and senses guides:
He loves my hart, for once it was his own;
I cherish his, because in me it bides.
His hart his wound received from my sight;
My hart was wounded, with his wounded hart;
For as fro
m me, on him his hurt did light,
So still me thought in me his hurt did smart:
Both equal hurt, in this change sought our bliss:
My true love hath my hart and I have his.
CAROL ANN DUFFY
White Writing
No vows written to wed you,
I write them white,
my lips on yours,
light in the soft hours of our married years.
No prayers written to bless you,
I write them white,
your soul a flame,
bright in the window of your maiden name.
No laws written to guard you,
I write them white,
your hand in mine,
palm against palm, lifeline, heartline.
No rules written to guide you,
I write them white,
words on the wind,
traced with a stick where we walk on the sand.
No news written to tell you,
I write it white,
foam on a wave
as we lift up our skirts in the sea, wade,
see last gold sun behind clouds,
inked water in moonlight.
No poems written to praise you,
I write them white.
DICK DAVIS
Uxor Vivamus…
The first night that I slept with you
And slept, I dreamt (these lines are true):
Now newly-married we had moved
Into an unkempt house we loved –
The rooms were large, the floors of stone,
The garden gently overgrown
With sunflowers, phlox, and mignonette –
All as we would have wished and yet
There was a shabby something there
Tainting the mild and windless air.
Where did it lurk? Alarmed we saw
The walls about us held the flaw –
They were of plaster, like grey chalk,
Porous and dead: it seemed our talk,
Our glances, even love, would die
With such indifference standing by.
Then, scarcely thinking what I did,
I chipped the plaster and it slid
In easy pieces to the floor;
It crumbled cleanly, more and more
Fell unresistingly away –
And there, beneath that deadening grey,
A fresco stood revealed: sky-blue
Predominated, for the view
Was an ebullient country scene,
The crowning of some pageant queen
Whose dress shone blue, and over all
The summer sky filled half the wall.
And so it was in every room,
The plaster’s undistinguished gloom
Gave way to dances, festivals,
Processions, muted pastorals –
And everywhere that spacious blue:
I woke, and lying next to you
Knew all that I had dreamt was true.
ABRAHAM COWLEY
The Wish
Well then, I now do plainly see,
This busy world and I shall ne’er agree;
The very honey of all earthly joy
Does of all meats the soonest cloy.
And they, methinks, deserve my pity,
Who for it can endure the stings,
The Crowd, and Buzz, and Murmurings
Of this great Hive, the City.
Ah, yet, ere I descend to th’ grave,
May I a small House and large Garden have!
And a few Friends, and many Books, both true,
Both wise, and both delightful too!
And since Love ne’er will from me flee,
A Mistress moderately fair,
And good as Guardian Angels are,
Only beloved and loving me!
O, Founts! O when in you shall I
Myself, eas’d of unpeaceful thoughts, espy?
O fields! O woods! when, when shall I be made
The happy Tenant of your shade?
Here’s the spring-head of Pleasure’s flood:
Here’s wealthy Nature’s treasury,
Where all the Riches lie that she
Has coin’d and stamp’d for good.
Pride and Ambition here
Only in far-fetch’d Metaphors appear;
Here nought but winds can hurtful Murmurs scatter,
And nought but Echo flatter.
The Gods, when they descended, hither
From Heaven did always choose their way:
And therefore we may boldly say
That ’tis the way too thither.
How happy here should I
And one dear She live, and embracing, die!
She who is all the world, and can exclude
In deserts solitude.
I should have then this only fear:
Lest men, when they my pleasures see,
Should hither throng to live like me,
And so make a City here.
PHILIP LARKIN
This Be The Verse
They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.
But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another’s throats.
Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don’t have any kids yourself.
ADRIAN MITCHELL
This Be the Worst
(after hearing that some sweet innocent thought that
Philip Larkin must have written: ‘They tuck you up,
your mum and dad’)
They tuck you up, your mum and dad,
They read you Peter Rabbit, too.
They give you all the treats they had
And add some extra, just for you.
They were tucked up when they were small,
(Pink perfume, blue tobacco-smoke),
By those whose kiss healed any fall,
Whose laughter doubled any joke.
Man hands on happiness to man,
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
So love your parents all you can
And have some cheerful kids yourself.
MAURA DOOLEY
Freight
I am the ship in which you sail,
little dancing bones,
your passage between the dream
and the waking dream,
your sieve, your pea-green boat.
I’ll pay whatever toll your ferry needs.
And you, whose history’s already charted
in a rope of cells, be tender to
those other unnamed vessels
who will surprise you one day,
tug-tugging, irresistible,
and float you out beyond your depth,
where you’ll look down, puzzled, amazed.
MARK STRAND
‘The Dreadful Has Already Happened’
The relatives are leaning over, staring expectantly.
They moisten their lips with their tongues. I can feel
them urging me on. I hold the baby in the air.
Heaps of broken bottles glitter in the sun.
A small band is playing old fashioned marches.
My mother is keeping time by stamping her foot.
My father is kissing a woman who keeps waving
to somebody else. There are palm trees.
The hills are spotted with orange flamboyants and tall
billowy clouds move behind them. ‘Go on, Boy,’
I hear somebody say, ‘Go on.’
I keep wondering if it will rain.
The sky darkens. There is thunder.
‘Break his legs,’ says one of my aunts,
&
nbsp; ‘Now give him a kiss.’ I do what I’m told.
The trees bend in the bleak tropical wind.
The baby did not scream, but I remember that sigh
when I reached inside for his tiny lungs and shook them
out in the air for the flies. The relatives cheered.
It was about that time I gave up.
Now, when I answer the phone, his lips
are in the receiver; when I sleep, his hair is gathered
around a familiar face on the pillow; wherever I search
I find his feet. He is what is left of my life.
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
My heart leaps up when I behold
A Rainbow in the sky:
So was it when my life began;
So is it now I am a Man;
So be it when I shall grow old,
Or let me die!
The Child is Father of the Man;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.
ROBERT BURNS
A Poet’s Welcome to his love-begotten
Daughter; the first instance that entitled
him to the venerable appellation of Father
Thou ’s welcome, Wean! Mischanter fa’ me,
If thoughts o’ thee, or yet thy Mamie,
Shall ever daunton me or awe me,
My bonie lady;
Or if I blush when thou shalt name me
Tyta, or Daddie. –
Tho’ now they ca’ me, Fornicator,
And tease my name in kintra clatter,
The mair they talk, I’m kend the better;
E’en let them clash!
An auld wife’s tongue ’s a feckless matter